On The Orientation Of Confucianism In Modern Chinese History

Wang Ermin, born in Huaiyang, Henan province in 1927, is known as a contemporary historian as well as an outstanding representative researcher in China’s modern history in Taiwan Island. Graduating from the department of history and geography in National Taiwan Normal University, Wang Ermin used to serve as a professor respectively in the Chinese university of Hong Kong and National Taiwan Normal University, and later as a research professor in the Institute of Modern History, Academia Sinica. He has been a productive researcher with his researches covering a great wide range, including ideological history of modern China, diplomatic history of modern China, military history of modern China and historical approaches. Besides, he has great achievements in literature. Wang Ermin has specially devoted to ideological history of modern China and his research on it has been most comprehensive and he has obtained the huge achievement on it. Additionally, he has unique perceptions on research approaches to historiography. The three books have reflected Wang’s lifelong deep understanding on the research approaches to historiography. This paper is to approach Wang Ermin’s academic orientation about modern history of China so as to have a better understanding and absorb his approaches to China’s modern history as well as its distinguishing features.As far as it is concerned, Wang Ermin began to study history in 1950, but his research on modern history of China started in 1955 when Guo Tingyi, admitted him into the Institute of Modern History, Academia Sinica. His researches cover a wide range of topics and have distinctive features. He advocates that ideological history researches should be based on unique concept and advance with the times. He is especially concerned about non-mainstream historiography and historian researches, which show his contributions to Nangang Scholar. He stresses the importance of respecting and inheriting traditional history of China. Wang Ermin not only inherits the excellent research style from Nangang Scholar, but encourages the approaches to the traditional history of China and put it into practice. His great achievements in researching the modern history of China have contributed much to the academic. His academic orientation will be of significance to our researches in the future.